


Time (dream is collapsing)

by SteveTrevorsStarship



Category: Fullmetal Alchemist - All Media Types
Genre: Hurt No Comfort, M/M, They're old, This fic is here so you cry, roy dies
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-16
Updated: 2020-07-16
Packaged: 2021-03-04 17:40:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 740
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25320265
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SteveTrevorsStarship/pseuds/SteveTrevorsStarship
Summary: Watching the person you love die is like watching a car accident in slow motion. You can see it happening, you step forward and you shout no, but there’s just nothing you can do. There’s no time. There’s never enough time.
Relationships: Edward Elric/Roy Mustang
Comments: 7
Kudos: 37





	Time (dream is collapsing)

**Author's Note:**

> I'm sorry this fic is such a mess, it just had to leave my mind before I cry. I headcanon that Ed is 66 and Roy is 80. They've been in a relationship for 45 years and married for 40 years.

Watching the person you love die is like watching a car accident in slow motion. You can see it happening, you step forward and you shout  _ no _ , but there’s just nothing you can do. There’s no time. There’s never enough time. 

All these years, and it’s still not enough time. 

Ed loves Roy. He loves him with all his heart. He loves the way he smiles, loves the way he winks, loves the way he charms people (even at the tender age of eighty). He loves how never stopped with the sappy shit, no matter how many years they were married. He loves,  _ loves, loves, loved  _ him. 

No– not past tense. Not yet.  _ We still have these last few moments. I can make these the happiest moments of Roy’s life. _

“Ed,” Roy says weakly from the hospital bed, his dark eyes swimming with confusion and pain. 

“Roy, love.” Ed squeezes his hand and waits for a squeeze back. He gets one, but it’s weak. Ed tries not to think about it. 

Roy coughs, the action shaking his whole body like he’s coughing up his soul in the middle of a hurricane and it’s just  _ begging  _ to leave his body and fly away in the torrent winds. “Ed, darling,” he wheezes, using his thumb to stroke the back of Ed’s hand. He’s slowly waking up, slowly remembering what he’s doing here. What’s going to happen.

_ He’s going to die,  _ Ed thinks.  _ There’s nothing I can do, he’s going to die. He’s going to die.  _

“I love you,” he says to Ed, and his eyes are so  _ clear  _ all of a sudden, like Ed’s the eye of this motherfucking stupid hurricane of death, like the fact he loves him is the only thing that makes fucking sense. “And I need you to be happy.” 

“No,” Ed says, his voice cracking on a sob. He wipes the tear away and swallows the cries that are begging to be released from his throat.  _ There’s no time for tears,  _ he thinks,  _ I have only a few moments left; I gotta make ‘em good.  _ “M’never gonna be happy without you, you dumb bastard.” 

“Yes, you are,” Roy says quietly, with such certainty that it  _ shakes _ Ed down to his bones. “You’re going to let yourself be happy and you’re going to cry on the shoulders of your children.” He pauses for another round of coughs. “Don’t be stupid and throw away the last years of your life that you have left with them, Edward.” 

“I can’t,” Ed says, letting the sob tear from his throat. “Not without you.”

“Darling,” Roy tells him, smiling at him with a glimmer of tears in his eyes, “You can do anything that you put your mind to.” 

“I don’t want to.”

“But you have to.” 

“Fuck your stupid rules.”

“I would say, ‘fuck me,’ but the doctor advised against that.” 

A small laugh interrupts the tears streaming down Ed’s face. He immediately clasps his hand over his mouth. “Holy shit,” he says wetly, tasting the salt of his tears. “You’re on your death bed, you can’t say shit like that.”

“Excuse me? I’m on my death bed, I can say whatever I want.” Roy stops talking as he starts coughing again. Ed can only squeeze his hand and watch him die slowly. The coughs don’t stop until the doctor moves forward to put something in his IV. Ed isn’t sure what, he isn’t paying attention to him. He’s paying attention to Roy, whose eyes never leave Ed’s. Even while he’s coughing his entire face screams  _ I love you and I’m so scared but I won’t say anything because I love you and I’ll see you hopefully later rather than sooner  _ and there’s an entire fucking speech in that look Roy is giving him, but Ed’s not going to try and decipher it. He’s content in just looking at the love of his life as he dies.

“I love you,” Ed says as the heart rate monitors slow and slow and slow and Roy’s eyes are fluttering closed. “And I know you love me, and I know you love the kids, and Riza already knows you’re thankful for everything she’s done,” he rambles on. He watches as Roy’s heart rate slows to a stop and he makes sure the last words his husband hears are “I love you,” by repeating it a thousand times.

_I loved you. And I still do._


End file.
